The Board Chronicles: Granada Hills Street Faire

henrymowry

11 years ago

The Board Chronicles is an ongoing series of articles about the adventures of Mrs M’s Handmade as a vendor at community festivals & craft fairs. Mrs M’s subsidiary, Mr M’s Woodshop, has been approved to create this chronicle for the good of vendorkind.

Granada Hills is in the northern San Fernando Valley, and is a good demographic match for us. Seems like a nice town; a commuter suburban community. Mrs M is in the community (and on the street the event is on) every week as a part of her “real” “job.”

This was our 8th event of 2014 (so, our 8th event ever). It was our 22nd event of 2015. It would appear we’ve picked up the pace a bit.

We were very happy with our sales last year of $577 (we were so young then!). That was not our goal for 2015. Not nearly. Also, this was only the 3rd event that we have repeated for 2 years running. More of those to come in the 4th quarter, of course, but this presented only our third opportunity to directly compare results year to year.

This was the 11th annual Street Faire, sponsored by the Granada Hills Chamber of Commerce. It had a bunch of vendors (150?) spread over 3 city blocks. There was a car show, stage entertainment, pony rides … it was a Street Fair. Or, Faire. Those Granada Hills folks do put on airs. I mean aires.

New Ideas

Last year, we had a single booth (we were so young then!). This year, it’s a double booth.
Mrs M took delivery of her new custom aprons (her boothwear) from the delightful Theresa of Heart Strings Creations. She was ready to rock it today!

Observations

I hate being lied to. Vendor instructions were very clear we could not get on the street before 8am. We were in line at 7:50a … and a host of vendors were already set up when we got on the street at 8am. Apparently, people were getting on as early as 6am. We didn’t need to be there at 6, but we would have certainly been there earlier if it had been a known option.
Hot. It was hot. 102*, Velda said. Hot.
We were next to a Chinese merchandise vendor (defined here as a booth selling very cheap kid-oriented merchandise almost certainly made in China). Lowered the property value of our booth.
Our neighbors on the other side and in back were local concerns, such as the booth for a state senator (they left early) and an air conditioning vendor (who didn’t have working models: bad plan).
It was hot.
When you’re hot and business is slow so you have nothing to think about but the heat, it’s really hot.
Conclusion: I don’t like 1 day events. We travel so heavy … it’s a 2 hour set-up and a 90 minute tear down. Easier if that work gets spread over 2 or 3 days.
I expected weather to impact some 4th quarter events, but I was expecting Godzilla El Nino. I never expected heat. But, it was hot, and the buyers stayed away in droves. Traffic was significantly down from last year, regardless of what our booths were offering.
Some of our vendor friends had better days than us (there were some buyers in the small crowd, just not enough of our buyers). Comparisons to last year aren’t fair … but we had a bad event.
Foreshadowing, it’s called. This day shall forever be known as The Lost Weekend: Part I. Tune in tomorrow for ….

The Food

Saturday Breakfast: Bagels & cream cheese.

Saturday Lunch: Velda found a new deli on this downtown street, and bought some salad and a couple of wraps. Better than fair food, but ultimately forgettable, IMHO.

Saturday Snack: Velda got an ice slush sugar thing. It was blue (which she gave me bites of) and red (that she ate exclusively). No clue what that means.

Saturday Dinner: Leftover meatloaf. Mmmmmm.